Rudy Giuliani on Judge John Roberts

This is a partial transcript from "Hannity &Colmes," July 20, 2005, that has been edited for clarity.

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ALAN COLMES, CO-HOST: If Judge John Roberts is confirmed, he will serve as the nation's 109th Supreme Court justice. What does his career tell us about the kind of justice he would be?

Joining us now, the former mayor of New York City, Rudolph Giuliani (search).

Rudy, good to see you, Mr. Mayor.

RUDOLPH GIULIANI, FORMER MAYOR OF NEW YORK CITY: Good to see you.

COLMES: You know him.

GIULIANI: I do.

COLMES: What do you know about him? How well do you know him?

GIULIANI: I know him from kind of the beginning of his career, when he was — right after he clerked for Justice Rehnquist, he came to work in the Justice Department (search). He worked for Attorney General Smith. That was his first job after clerking. And I knew him then. I knew him all throughout the time that he worked in the White House.

He's a remarkable candidate. I mean, there is nothing in his background that doesn't say "superb qualifications for the Supreme Court." His education, his academic performance, the extraordinary fact that he's argued 39 times before the Supreme Court. Very few people get confirmed...

(CROSSTALK)

COLMES: Now, on abortion — now, you are pro-choice, right?

GIULIANI: Yes.

COLMES: You're a pro-choice Republican.

GIULIANI: I am.

COLMES: There's some questions to whether, you know, Roe vs. Wade (search). He made one statement as solicitor general and deputy solicitor general and saying that it should be overturned, Roe v. Wade. None of — go ahead.

GIULIANI: Actually, he made that statement arguing a case before the court, in which that was the position of his client. So you can't...

(CROSSTALK)

COLMES: And then he said it's established law when he was up for confirmation in 2003. How do we glean from that? And how do we read the tea leaves in this?

GIULIANI: You don't. What you glean from that is you listen to the argument before the court. You listen to his colleagues and he'll make a decision.

And like any Supreme Court justice, he'll be very much influenced by precedent, but if he thinks that something is said to him or there's some argument that appeals to his intellect, his common sense, his background, I mean, the Supreme Court usually sticks with precedence. And sometimes they overturn them.

COLMES: Now, Roe vs. Wade -- You are pro-choice. How important is it to you as a pro-choice Republican to have a pro-choice on the court as someone...

GIULIANI: That is not the critical factor. And what's important to me is to have a very intelligent, very honest, very good lawyer on the court. And he fits that category, in the same way Justice Ginsburg fit that category.

I mean, she was — she maybe came at it from a very different political background, very qualified lawyer, very smart person. Lots of Republicans supported her. I expect, and listening to Senator Nelson, I expect that John Roberts will get support from a lot of Democrats.

COLMES: Now, he is coming under fire from some Democrats for claiming — they're claiming he is a partisan, that he had a behind-the-scenes role in advising the Florida attorney general during the 2000 election fight, that he gave money to the Bush-Cheney 2000 campaign...

GIULIANI: He's a Republican.

COLMES: ... made the maximum. Is that...

GIULIANI: Who do you think the president's going to appoint?

COLMES: All right, but in other words...

GIULIANI: How many Republicans did President Clinton appoint?

COLMES: Should it be partisan like that?

GIULIANI: He isn't that partisan. He's a Republican who believes in the Republican Party and no more partisan than lots of people who get appointed to the United States Supreme Court and turn out to be excellent justices.

COLMES: So it's not an issue if you've donated ...

(CROSSTALK)

GIULIANI: Earl Warren was the governor of a state. He was the Republican-elected governor of a state and...

(CROSSTALK)

COLMES: ... donated money to the guy whose nominated you, if you've given him money, money to his campaign, if you've worked to get him elected, behind the scenes advising the attorney general?

GIULIANI: Sure. That's be exactly the kind of person you'd think that you'd want to appoint, somebody who shares kind of your general outlook, but hasn't indicated and hasn't really predetermined most of the cases that are going to be determined by the court.

Presidents, going back to the beginning of the republic, generally appoint people on the Supreme Court that they believe agree with them. It's sort of an extraordinary thing to ask of President Bush. Nobody asked it of President Clinton.

President Clinton appointed people that basically agreed with his political philosophy, which is left of center. Of course, President Bush is going to appoint people that basically agree with his political philosophy. And then what we found out about the Supreme Court is, we don't really know until after they're on the court where they're going to end up.

You know what's funny to me? Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 96-3. Stephen Breyer, 89-9, or something like that. It seems like all of these fights come when Republicans are in power.

It seems like the Democrats feel they have the right to appoint liberal judges when they're in office and when Republicans are in office.

GIULIANI: I think the Democrats have a really difficult choice here. Because I think, if they do an all-out opposition to John Roberts, they're going to really lose credibility, because he is precisely what they've been talking about, someone who is extremely well-qualified, someone who's — because he hasn't been on the court for a long time, someone whose opinions you don't really know completely, but you kind of get a sense of his general philosophy. If they oppose him, then they are going to oppose anybody that George Bush appoints.

HANNITY: It was yesterday, because yesterday, early in the day, we thought that it was going to be Edith Clement (search). And all the left-wing groups were quick to be sending out faxes.

And then, five minutes after they announced Mr. Roberts, everyone of these groups, theACLU (search), Howard Dean, the DNC, Human Rights Campaign (search), Moveon.org, NARAL, Now, People for the American Way, Alliance for Justice, immediately trashed this guy.

GIULIANI: Right.

HANNITY: I don't think there was anybody...

GIULIANI: Well, it was inevitable, right? I mean, that part of the process is inevitable. But I think what's going to happen in the Senate is going to be very interesting to see.

Because I think, if Democrats do an all-out effort against John Roberts, they're going to lose credibility maybe for another fight that'll be down the road later. So ultimately I believe they're going to decide not to go all-out against him. And I think he's going to get nominated.

HANNITY: Poor Chuck Schumer. You just gave him heart palpitations. He's going to have a hard time hearing you say that.

GIULIANI: Well, I think that strong opposition to him essentially means they're going to oppose anybody the president appoints and they're oing to lose a lot of credibility.

HANNITY: Quick question. You were in London during the bombings. We're now finding out tonight, some of the London papers are reporting, that there was an Al Qaeda-Bin Laden (search) link, some phone records that they've been able to piece together. What does that mean to you?

GIULIANI: Well, you know, that's sort of the feeling I had when I was there. I was a half a block away when the first bomb went off at Liverpool Station. I watched the whole thing, and it was an eerie kind of reminder of September 11th.

And the first sense that you got was — I mean, it's too much of a coincidence for this not to be somehow connected. So I mean, I don't have any inside information, and there was a lot of conflicting information that day, even when I talked to the prime minister.

But I wouldn't be surprised to find that out. I mean, it sort of fits what your general impression is.

HANNITY: I'm not even going to ask, by the way, if you are running. I promised. I'm not going to ask.

GIULIANI: OK.

HANNITY: Good to see you. This is going to be interesting, this is going to be interesting to see what happens [with Judge Roberts]...

GIULIANI: Good to see you.

COLMES: Mr. Mayor, it's good to see you. Thanks for being here tonight.

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